Lover of the Light
by Ermily
Summary: What I think would have happened if Maura had gone with Frost and Korsak to Dominic's apartment in the episode Crazy for You. Rizzles. Rating may change in future chapters.


**Disclaimer: I don't own Rizzoli and Isles. I ship Rizzles, for goodness' sake!**

**If Maura had gone to the apartment in Crazy for You...**

* * *

"Frankie, get me out of these things," Jane rasped, her voice shaky and her eyes full of tears. When her brother unlocked the first set of handcuffs, she brought a trembling hand to her face and brushed the teardrops away. It wouldn't do her any good to show her weakness now.

"Are you okay?" Frankie sounded concerned. Jane looked down to see blood streaming down her wrists, from her ceaseless struggling against the cuffs. "Do you want me to call up the EMTs?"

"I..." She could only stare at her wrists because her mouth had chosen that moment to stop working. The ruby red droplets slid down her pale skin, and she focused on it as if it didn't belong to her. Frankie gave her a moment and moved to cut the cords around her ankles, which were red but thankfully not bleeding, and she discovered that she couldn't stop shaking. Why couldn't she stop shaking?

"Jane!" A high-pitched, worried, _familiar _voice called to her from the doorway and she looked up to see Maura standing there. Her face was white as a sheet, and her eyes kept flitting between Jane's wrists and Frost and Korsak trying to wrestle a pair of cuffs on their murderer.

"Maura?"

This brought the blonde haired woman to Jane's side in an instant. God, she must have sounded like complete and utter shit because Maura got even paler upon hearing her speak.

"Oh my goodness, let me take a look at you," Maura captured Jane's wrists lightly between her fingertips, and Jane hissed and recoiled at the contact with the marred skin. "Oh! I'm sorry-"

"No, Maura. It's okay." Jane held her wrists out again and this time, Maura only ran her eyes over them. "I'm okay. I just need a bandage or two and-"

Before she could say another word, Maura had thrown her arms around her and buried her face in Jane's shoulder. Jane sat there, frozen, as the other woman sobbed and hugged her tighter to her chest, but was oddly satisfied in knowing that she could offer her friend that level of comfort. The EMTs strode into the room, a stretcher trailing behind them, but Frankie intercepted them near the door.

"Hey," Jane murmured. Maura released her instantly and wiped her eyes on her sleeve, something that Jane had never seen her do. Ever. As she began to back away, Jane pushed herself into a sitting position and swung her legs over the side of the bed. "We'll talk in a minute, okay? I just need to get patched up."

"All right, I mean-I'm sorry-" Maura was speechless, another rare sight for Jane. It was disconcerting. "I should probably wait outside and let the investigation continue- without my presence obstructing the crime scene."

Back to mechanical Maura, then. Even weirder.

"No, you're not 'obstructing' anything. Stay," Jane reached for Maura's hand, but stopped once she saw blood running down her fingertips. "Please."

The EMTs made quick work of cleaning the blood from her arms, then bandaging her wrists, and within minutes she had given her statement and was seated in the backseat of Frankie's cruiser beside Maura. Her hands had stopped shaking, probably because the initial shock had worn off and she was now worried about her friend's unusual behavior, but she didn't think too much of it. The last thing Jane wanted was for that uneasy and unclean feeling to return, just because she was overanalyzing the situation. God, she was starting to sound like Maura.

"So," Frankie climbed into the drivers' seat and turned back to look at them through the grating. "That sick son of a bitch has a one hundred percent chance of getting convicted. Korsak and Frost are taking him back to the precinct for questioning now, and I'm supposed to take you home."

Maura's head turned to the side at almost the same time Jane glanced over at her.

"I think Maura and I are going to hang out for a little while." Hang out? What was this, high school all over again?

"At my place." Maura added, and Frankie shrugged before turning back around and starting the car. Jane glanced over at Maura to see the other woman staring intently out the window, as if hell-bent on ignoring the person sitting beside her.

"Maura," Jane began, but she trailed off when the woman in question's head whipped around to face her. Maura's eyes were full of tears once more and her breathing was heavy and erratic. "Hey, breathe. I'm right here. Calm down, um... tell me something I don't know. Anything."

Maura sat there for a moment, staring at Jane as if she had grown another head, before opening her mouth to speak.

"Th-there are ... ten human body parts that are only three letters long. Eye, h-hip, arm, leg, ear, t-toe, rib, lip, and gum." She stammered. Jane grabbed her hands and forced her to make eye contact.

"Again."

"The elephant is the only animal with four knees." This time her voice was strong, and Jane smiled in response. Hazel eyes locked onto brown ones, and the corners of Maura's eyes crinkled in amusement when Jane's eyebrows raised in appreciation of the fact.

"There we go, Doctor Isles is back with us once again. I was a little worried there for a second." Jane let her smile widen into a grin, and patted Maura on the shoulder. "I haven't seen you freak out like that since..."

She let her mind catch up to her mouth and the words trailed off. _Since Hoyt tried to kill them both _was what had almost slipped out. Jane's hands fisted at her sides at the sudden memory, and Maura's fingers closed even tighter around the strap of the bag in her lap.

"Now that all of my mental faculties are properly in place, I should probably ask the important question." Maura broke the tense silence and glanced over at the stark white bandages on Jane's wrists. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine." Jane reassured her. "Been better, though. At least you found me in time. Thank you."

"I wish we had found you before he could lay a finger on you." Maura whispered, her voice hoarse. Jane laid a hand on her forearm and squeezed gently. "I-I should have seen it sooner, that it wasn't your bedroom and-"

"Don't," Jane moved her arm across the other woman's shoulders and pulled her close. "That sick fuck decided to make it hard for all of us. I'm surprised you caught it with so little to go on, Maur. You're incredible."

"Well, I have been referred to as the best Medical Examiner in Boston," Maura replied with a giggle.

"Damn straight!" Frankie piped up from the driver's seat, which caused both Jane and Maura to jump in surprise. Jane's free hand had instinctively moved to the place where her holster would have been, and Maura jolted closer to Jane's side. "Sorry, I shouldn't have been eavesdropping on you guys. You've been through a lot."

"How could you not?" Maura's voice shook slightly, but her normal know-it-all tone had reappeared. "There's only a thin layer of metal grating separating the back of the car from the front, and the ability to decipher-"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, Frankie's sitting up close and listening in on girl talk, I get it." Jane growled impatiently. "What's the holdup? We've been sitting here for like, five minutes."

"That's because you've been too busy gabbin' away to notice we've been sitting in Maura's driveway," Frankie rolled his eyes and popped the locks on the back doors. "I have to go back to the precinct and fill out some paperwork, but you two are cleared for a couple of days, if you need it. Well, that's what Korsak told me, anyway."

"Thanks," Jane shot him a small smile from the both of them, and practically pushed Maura out of the back of the car.

"Good luck dealing with Ma!" Frankie had rolled down his window and shouted across the darkened lawn. "She's been really worried, Janie. And goodnight, Maura."

"Thank you," Maura called back, as Jane let out an exasperated sigh.

"Damn, I forgot all about Ma."

Maura chose not to reply to that and began digging around in her bag for her keys. Strange, Maura Isles didn't have everything perfectly organized for once. It seemed like all of the things in her enormous purse had been tossed in willy-nilly, and there were even more random items, like case files she recognized from Frost's desk.

"Why do you have-"

Before Jane could finish her question, the porch light flickered on above them and the door flew open.

"Jane Clementine Rizzoli, don't you scare me like that ever again!" Angela flew out the front door and practically tackled her daughter to the pavement. Maura managed to sidestep out of the way at the last second and avoid being struck, but she wasn't completely ignored. "And Maura, you get over here! You must have been worried sick as well!"

They stood for a moment awkwardly smushed together as Angela practically sobbed all over Jane.

"Ma-"

"I knew him too!" Angela cried. "I knew Dominic for years and we trusted him! But he was completely crazy."

"Angela, he was very careful to hide the signs of his illness when he was in public," Maura cut in gently as Jane tried to ease out of her mother's death-grip. "I didn't even catch it, and I'm supposed to be a trained professional."

"Okay everyone, stop it with the self-blaming!" Jane threw her hands up into the air to exaggerate her point, and Maura let her mouth snap shut. "Dominic was a sick bastard who pretty much one-upped everyone in the precinct, but you still beat him and saved me. I'm sick of everyone thinking it's their own fault when it's his. It's all because of his fucked up brain! God, I need a beer."

She pushed past her mother and Maura at the door to enter the kitchen, grabbed a beer from the fridge, and began digging around in one of the drawers in the island for a bottle opener. Angela sniffed loudly and mumbled something about getting some rest and talking to them in the morning, and Maura took a moment to compose herself completely before striding into the kitchen after her friend.

"I don't care how rude that sounded," Jane began before Maura could even open her mouth. She had found the bottle opener and popped the cap off with a flick of her wrist. "I'm sick of it. I don't want anyone feeling bad about themselves over this. Besides, nothing horrible happened! I'm okay, and alive, and the perp is in jail. That's all that matters."

"I shoved almost the entire contents of the top of Barry's desk into my bag before we left." Maura blurted out. Jane's brow furrowed in confusion, and Maura began to elaborate while choosing a bottle of wine from the rack near the fridge. "That's what you were asking earlier, why my bag was a mess. I was worried, and I wasn't thinking straight-"

"That doesn't happen that often, does it?" Jane attempted to joke with her, but Maura's expression remained pained and serious. "Let me get that for you."

Jane reached for the wine and the corkscrew but Maura pulled them back, just out of her reach.

"I'm perfectly capable of opening a bottle of wine, Jane."

"Your hands are shaking."

Maura's eyes glanced down at her hands, which were trembling slightly, and begrudgingly put the bottle onto the counter. Jane picked up the bottle opener, but twisting the cork out was tough on her mangled wrists. She let out a hiss of pain as the cork finally popped out of the bottle, and Maura shot her a slightly annoyed look. However, she would gladly trade a little soreness for the knowledge that Maura would definitely avoid slicing her hand open due to worry.

They sat on the couch for a while in silence, sipping their respective beverages and shifting uncomfortably under the blankets, before Jane started making jokes about her "honeymoon pictures," which caused Maura to chuckle. This escalated into teasing about Maura and Dr. Pike's relationship, which was nonexistent but fun to poke fun at(at least from Jane's point of view, anyway), and both of them were full out laughing. After about an hour, Jane glanced at the clock and Maura downed the last of her wine before speaking.

"Do you want me to drive you home?"

Jane suddenly looked small as she unconsciously burrowed deeper into the cushions of the couch and shook her head.

"I...I don't want to see that room again yet." She whispered. Maura shifted closer to her, and she appreciated the comfort from her friend."It's sad, being afraid of my own bedroom, but I need to stay away for a while."

"I understand." Maura smiled sadly and leaned back. "I just tidied up the guest room yesterday, if you'd like to stay there."

"You're the best, Maura. Thanks."

* * *

"_Jane_."

Jane's eyes snapped open in recognition of the voice calling her name but when she tried to sit up, she found that she was bound to the bed the same way she was in Dominic's apartment. She recognized the ceiling of Maura's guestroom above her, but the room was dark and it took her eyes a moment to adjust. However when they did, her stomach dropped and her heart all but stopped. A man was leaning over her, an evil smirk stretched across his thin lips and a scalpel in hand.

"Hoyt."

"Good, you remember me!" He said with a giggle as he twirled the scalpel around in the air in front of her eyes. "Now that we're past that, it's time for me to finish what I started all those years ago."

"You're supposed to be dead! I killed you." Jane's eyes widened in fear as his smirk widened into a full-blown grin.

"Maybe I'm your own personal demon, Jane," He whispered. All remaining color drained from her face. "And the devil's decided he's not quite done with you yet. This is going to be fun."

There was a moment of silence, where Jane had stopped breathing, before he swiftly straddled her on the bed.

"NO!" Jane screamed as he brought the scalpel down into the flesh of her open palm, reopening the scarred cuts and causing her eyes to roll back into her head in pain. "HELP ME! SOMEBODY HELP ME, PLEASE!"

"There's nobody here to hear you scream," Hoyt hissed as he repeated his stabbing motion on her other palm, this time twisting the blade around and making her cry out in pain. He lowered his lips to her ear, his hot, rancid breath causing an icy shiver to slide down her spine, and whispered gleefully. "I already took care of your girlfriend. She was a good playmate. Soft, but not too quiet once we got started."

"MAURA!" Jane thrashed around on the bed beneath him, attempting to free herself and find her friend, but was yet again unable to escape the restraints that shackled her to the bedposts. Hoyt laughed maniacally and raised his blade to strike again. "You BASTARD! I'LL KILL YOU!"

"Oh I don't think that's possible now, my dear. It seems I have the upper hand." His laughter increased ten-fold when she cried out and wriggled around even harder, trying with all her might to escape. To find out if it was really true. Maura couldn't be dead, not while Jane was supposed to be protecting her! Hoyt's knees locked around her waist, stopping her motion entirely, and the tip of the scalpel found its way to her jugular. "I'm sorry this has to end so soon, Jane. I was having fun!"

White hot pain seared through every nerve ending in her body as she felt the blade dig into the soft skin at her neck, and blood began to flow from the large wound. She was going to die, that was for certain. At least as she was losing more and more blood, Hoyt's face began fading above her.

"I win." The smug look on his face would haunt her forever.

"NO!"

"Jane!"

Jane's eyes flew open and her eyes, once again, fixed blearily on the darkened ceiling of Maura's guest room. She was drenched in cold sweat, tense, and trembling more than she had been at the crime scene earlier. After a moment she saw Maura standing at the door, a wooden baseball bat in hand and a frightened look on her face.

"Maura." Jane sounded so pitiful, so weak, as her shoulders sagged in relief. She was alive, it had only been a horrible dream. However, Jane couldn't shake the awful feeling of Hoyt's body on top of her, and the nausea that accompanied the thought of Maura being murdered by the man that had caused her so much pain.

Maura threw the bat to the ground, bolted to the side of the bed, and threw her arms around her friend.

"I heard you screaming," She whispered, as she tightened her grip around Jane's shoulders. Her thumbs found the tense muscles in the trembling woman's shoulder blades and began easing them back to normal. "And I thought someone had gotten in, that Dominic had escaped or something-"

"It was awful." Jane interrupted, not wanting Maura to spiral back downward into hysterics. "Hoyt said-" She took a deep breath and savored Maura's delicate ministrations on her back before continuing. "He said that he'd killed you. And then he tried to kill me, too."

She looked down at her hands, where the scars from her first encounter with the insane doctor had faded, and could still picture the scalpel protruding from her flesh, even though it was just a dream. Her palms throbbed from the memory, and she let an uncontrollable shudder coarse through her body. Maura pulled Jane closer and let her hands drift down, toward her midsection.

"Hoyt is dead. He can't hurt anyone anymore." Maura breathed. She was clearly trying to keep calm for her friend, but Jane didn't miss the panicked look in her eyes.

"That's the thing, Maura," Jane began. "He's still hurting me. He's decided to haunt me through my dreams, and this time it was worse than it's ever been before. Only because he said he'd won, that he thought he'd broken me. All because of you."

"What?" Maura sounded confused and hurt.

"He used you to get to me," The color of Jane's cheeks began to darken as she continued to speak. "Because I care about you more than anyone. It's not your fault at all, it's mine..."

Maura pulled back, her arms still loosely wrapped around Jane's waist, to look her friend straight in the eye.

And then she kissed her.

God, Maura's lips were so soft. And warm, and felt like they were _made_ for Jane to kiss for a lifetime.

"Mmph," Jane mumbled against Maura's lips, which caused her to pull back with a start.

"I'm so sorry, I shouldn't have-" She started to panic, but Jane took the opportunity given to her and attacked her lips again, this time sliding her tongue into Maura's open mouth.

Maura's eyes widened in shock and she sat there for a moment, frozen, as Jane's tongue continued to drift over her tongue and teeth, willing her to respond. And good God, she did. With a ferocity that Jane didn't know the other woman possessed, Maura pushed Jane flat on her back atop the bedspread and straddled her without breaking the contact between them at all. One of Jane's hands moved to the back of Maura's head and wound its fingers into her gorgeous blonde locks. The other splayed across her lower back and forced her hips downward, causing them to grind against those of the woman below her. A breathy moan erupted from Maura's lips and she quivered at the intimate contact between them.

As the need for oxygen overwhelmed them and Maura pulled back, panting, to take a breath, Jane became fully aware and her blood ran cold. She knew that it was completely wrong of her to be afraid of someone on top of her, especially Maura, but the sudden realization of her vulnerable situation took her by surprise. And as the time quickly passed, it took her breath away.

"Jane," Maura instantly knew that something was off and sat up, while pulling Jane up with her. "Talk to me."

"It's stupid." Shit, did her voice just crack? And were those tears starting to cloud her vision? "I-I don't want you to worry about it."

"It's clearly not stupid, since you're frightened," Maura replied. "Don't give me that look, it's completely obvious that you're uncomfortable with something and if..."

Her voice trailed off and she turned to look away from the woman in front of her.

"Hey," Jane brought her fingertips to Maura's chin and turned her head back to look her straight in the eye. "I want to be with you, and if that wasn't clear by what just happened then I don't know what else to do to prove that to you. It's just," Jane cleared her throat and brought her sleeve up to wipe her damp eyes. "A crazy psychopath, well, two crazy psychopaths had me pinned to a bed today and I realized how defenseless that made me feel."

"I'm sorry-"

"Don't be. It's not your fault." Jane took a shaky breath and brushed her hair away from her face. "I meant it. I want to be with you completely, but I can't stop freaking out over this. I can't stop feeling their hands all over me."

Jane shuddered, and Maura brought a hand to her face to tenderly cup her cheek.

"You are one of the strongest women I know, and I'm surprised that you're holding together after all that happened tonight." They sat there for a moment, savoring the slight contact and the comfort it brought each of them.

"Can I ask you a favor?" Jane asked quietly, as if she knew beforehand that she was going to be rejected. This made Maura anxious and she replied quickly.

"Anything."

"Will you-I mean could you-If you want to, because if not that's fine..." Jane babbled, not quite able to get her point across.

"Spit it out, Detective." Maura teased with a smile, and Jane's confidence visibly strengthened.

"Stay with me. Please." There was something she wasn't saying, something that was eating away at her inside, but Maura could make it out with no problem.

_I'm scared._

Instead of replying with words, Maura moved to lay under the soft sheets and patted the space beside her. Jane shot her a small, relieved smile and joined her. They stayed on separate sides of the bed for a few awkward moments, but after what sounded like a "screw it" from Jane's side, they met in the middle and wrapped their arms around each other. Their grip was tight, as if they were afraid that the world would spring another surprise on them now that they were going somewhere, and that they could lose each other again.

"Thank you." Jane breathed, her words muffled because her face was buried in Maura's silky blonde locks. God, she smelled wonderful. "So much. You are a saint, Maura Isles."

"I wouldn't go _quite_ that far." Maura murmured in reply, but Jane felt her lips curl into a smile against her shoulder.

They fell asleep that way, curled into one another and smiling at the comfort they found from the intimate contact.

**I want this to continue on to a longer fic, so please tell me what you thought about it! Thanks a bunch :)**


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